All three 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges hearing oral argument Wednesday on Gray Television’s appeal of a $518,000 FCC forfeiture order seemed skeptical of the agency’s rationale for the penalty amount but split on Gray’s arguments against the FCC’s authority over deals for TV station network affiliation.
Monty Tayloe
Monty Tayloe, Associate Editor, covers broadcasting and the Federal Communications Commission for Communications Daily. He joined Warren Communications News in 2013, after spending 10 years covering crime and local politics for Virginia regional newspapers and a turn in television as a communications assistant for the PBS NewsHour. He’s a Virginia native who graduated Fork Union Military Academy and the College of William and Mary. You can follow Tayloe on Twitter: @MontyTayloe .
Adell Broadcasting will bring legal action against Nexstar and Mission Broadcasting if Mission doesn’t accept the FCC’s conditions for approving Mission’s proposed $75 million buy of Adell’s WADL Mount Clemens, Michigan (see 2404240070), Adell CEO Kevin Adell told us in an interview Tuesday.
Standard General and its founder Soohyung Kim filed a civil complaint Wednesday charging that Allen Media CEO Byron Allen, Dish CEO Charlie Ergen and FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, along with lawmakers, unions and public interest groups, were partners in a conspiracy and race discrimination aimed at sinking Standard's $8.6 billion purchase of Tegna last year (see 2306010077). The filing was made in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. “The FCC Chairwoman and her personal staffer blocked the deal at the behest of Mr. Allen, who used business allies and six-figure political donations to destroy Mr. Kim’s chances of acquiring TEGNA,” the complaint said.
The FCC Enforcement Bureau should change tactics to avoid the risk of targets making an end run around its processes by taking advantage of recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions to drag the agency into litigation, said former FCC General Counsel Tom Johnson in a white paper sponsored by CTIA and published Monday by Wiley, where he's a partner.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit seemed skeptical of oral arguments Thursday that Congress didn’t intend for video surveillance gear from Chinese companies Hikvision and Dahua to be placed on the FCC’s “covered list” and barred from the agency’s equipment authorization program (see 2309210032) when lawmakers added those companies to a list of security threats and separately ordered the FCC not to authorize gear from companies on the list. “We can’t write an opinion that says we think Congress was just kidding,” said Judge Florence Pan.
FCC and industry officials don’t expect a 2018 Quadrennial Review vote by the Dec. 27 deadline ordered by the D.C. Circuit (see 2309290056) and the item isn’t expected to be part of the December meeting agenda, they said in interviews this week.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit show cause order Thursday giving the FCC 90 days to complete its 2018 quadrennial review was characterized Friday by NAB as a “big win” in an email to members. But broadcast and public interest attorneys said the agency was likely already on a path to approve the QR in that timeline.
Lawyers for DOJ and 48 states, in opening statements Tuesday in the government's antitrust bench trial against Google in U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia, argued that the tech company exercised monopoly power through ad sales tools and through deals requiring its search engine to be the default on Android phones and in some browsers. “Monopoly maintenance starts with defaults,” said Kenneth Dintzer, DOJ senior trial counsel.
Susan Patrick, co-owner of broadcast brokerage Patrick Communications and radio broadcaster Legend Communications, pleaded guilty to a felony charge of filing a false tax return and trying to conceal $9.5 million in earnings from the IRS in returns for the 2012, 2013 and 2014 tax years, said criminal filings (docket 1:23-cr-00254) Aug. 31 in U.S. District Court for Maryland in Baltimore and publicized in a DOJ release.
Congressional delegation of authority and enforcement power to agencies and the tenure protections of agency administrative law judges aren't unconstitutional, argued the SEC in a petitioner's brief before the U.S. Supreme Court Monday in SEC v. Jarkesy. The brief hewed closely to the arguments the SEC made in its loss before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, law professors and attorneys told us. “There’s nothing unexpected in it,” emailed Arizona State law professor Ilan Wurman, who filed an amicus brief in the case supporting neither party. A SCOTUS decision in SEC v. Jarkesy could have ramifications for other federal agencies that use ALJs, such as the FCC (see 2211030063).